1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a coin processor which is used for various types of automatic service machines including automatic vending machines and, more particularly, to an improved coin processor which can prevent its erroneous operation when coins are continuously inserted thereinto, which can change the coin pay-out start timing to realize faster payment of coins, or which also can shorten the coin payment time of a coin dispenser which is capable of simultaneous payment of a plurality of sorts or denomenations of coins.
2. Description of the Related Art
In such a coin processor for use in various types of automatic service machines including automatic vending machines, in general, the coin processor first guides a coin inserted through a coin slot to a coin discriminator unit to discriminate whether the inserted coin is a true or false coin and if it is true one, also discriminates its coin sort, and then guides to a true/false coin distributor unit to perform distributing operation between true and false coins.
The coin discriminator unit is configured as, an electronic discriminator for electronically discriminating the inserted coin whether it is a true or false coin and the sort of the inserted coin with use of coin detection coils. The true/false distributor is made up of a true/false coin distributing lever and a true/false coin distributing solenoid for driving the lever, so that when the inserted coin is judged to be a true one by the coin discriminator unit, for example, the true/false coin distributing solenoid is turned ON, whereby the true/false coin distributing lever is shifted to its true coin passage side to guide the coin passed through the coin discriminator to a true coin passage. When the inserted coin is judged to be a false one by the coin discriminator, on the other hand, the true/false coin distributing solenoid remains in its OFF state and thus the true/false distributing lever is in its non-driven state, that is, in its shifted state to its coin return passage side to guide the coin passed through the coin discriminator to a coin return port via the return passage.
The coins guided to the true coin passage are further distributed according to coin sorts, and coins to be used as change are accumulated in coin tubes according to the coin sorts.
With such a coin processor as mentioned above, when a plurality of coins are inserted through the coin slot, it becomes impossible for the machine to carry out its accurate distribution of the inserted coins depending on their coin sorts. And when a false coin is inserted followed by a true coin, the false coin is wrongly guided into the true coin passage.
A recent automatic vending machine system is configured as a function dispersion system in which different units are assigned for respectively different functions. This function dispersion type system includes, for example, a coin mech unit for performing mainly a coin managing operation and a main controller for performing a determining operation of the amount of payment money and managing and controlling operation over its determination command and so on.
In such a function dispersion type system, the coin payment control is carried out so that a command issued from the main controller causes the coin mech unit to be put in its coin payment enable state, whereby when the coin mech unit is put in the coin payment enable state, the main controller transmits a coin payment command to the coin mech unit. When the coin mech unit receives the coin payment command, the coin payment control is shifted to the coin mech unit side and the solenoid and motor for coin payment are driven under the control of the coin mech unit to pay out coins.
With the above-mentioned arrangements, the following configuration (1) and (2) have been conventionally considered for realizing the high speed coin payment.
1) The coin payment motor in the coin mech unit is driven at a higher speed.
2) A plurality of coins are paid at the same time.
However, these methods, which realize direct reduction of the coin payment operational time, both have limitations based on mechanical restrictions in the higher-speed of the coin payment motor of the coin mech unit and in the simultaneous payment of the plurality of coins.
Also, the higher-speed coin payment can be attained also by setting faster the start timing of the coin payment in addition to the direct reduction of the coin payment operational time.
In other words, the time necessary for the coin payment is determined by the total time required by the time elasped from the generation of a coin payment request before start of the coin payment operation of the coin mech unit and the time directly required for the payment operation itself. Though the time directly required for the coin payment operation has a limitation due to the mechanical restrictions, when the time necessary for the coin mech unit to start the coin paying operation is made as short as possible, the higher-speed coin payment can be realized.
A coin mech unit in a prior art automatic vending machine system arranged as the function dispersion type system, in general, includes an acceptor (coin discriminative distributor) for discriminatively distributing inserted coins, coin tubes (coin accumulator) for accumulating ones of the coins distributed by the acceptor to be paid as short change, and a coin mech body (coin accumulator/payer) having a coin payer for paying out coins from the coin tubes. The acceptor and coin mech body are provided with respective controllers, i.e., an acceptor controller and a coin payment controller.
A general arrangement of the prior art automatic vending machine system having such an arrangement as mentioned above is shown in FIG. 14. The illustrated system includes a main controller 10 as a central component, a coin payment controller 20, an article transfer controller 40, a display controller 50, the latter controllers 20, 40, 50 being connected to the main controller 10 through a communication line 60, the coin payment controller 20 being connected with an acceptor controller 30.
In this case, the coin payment controller 20 performs control over the coin mech body, i.e., control of paying out coins from coin tubes, the acceptor controller 30 performs control over an acceptor, i.e., control of discriminating between inserted coins and distributing them, such control information being transmitted from the acceptor controller 30 to the coin payment controller 20. Further, the article transfer controller 40 performs control of transferring or conveying a purchased article, and the display controller 50 performs control of displaying the total money amount of the inserted coins and control of purchaser's selective input of the article to be purchased.
With such an arrangement, when it is desired to pay out change for example, the main controller 10 first transmits a payment set command to the coin payment controller 20 to set the coin payment controller 20 in its coin payment enable state. The main controller 10, when receiving a payment enable notification from the coin payment controller 20 as a response, transmits a payment command to the coin payment controller 20. The coin payment controller 20 in turn, when receiving the payment command from the main controller 10, starts its change paying operation.
In this case, even when the coin payment controller 20 receives the payment set command from the main controller 10, the coin payment controller 20 cannot immediately transmit the payment enable notification to the main controller 10. Because, if a next coin has already been inserted in the acceptor and this coin has not been counted yet at the time the coin payment controller 20 receives the payment set command, and if the coin payment controller 20 transmits the payment enable notification to the main controller 10 at this time point, the main controller shifts to the coin paying operation and thus the coin in question is simply taken by the machine.
Further, if the inserted coin has already been counted but the coin is still in the acceptor when the coin payment controller 20 receives the payment set command, and if the controller 20 has already shifted to its coin paying operation before the coins fall into the coin tubes, coin clogging may take place or lacking of the change may take place when the counted coin is to be used as change,.
In the prior art system, the acceptor is controlled by the acceptor controller 30 and the coin mech body is controlled by the coin payment controller 20 different from the controller 30, so that the acceptor controller 30 can know whether or not coins are present within the acceptor but the coin payment controller 20 cannot know it.
For this reason, this sort of prior art system is arranged so that, taking into consideration the situation when the coins are present within the acceptor, the coin payment controller 20, when receiving the payment set command from the main controller 10, waits by a time necessary for complete dropping of the coins within the acceptor onto the bottoms of the coin tubes, and then transmits the payment enable notification to the main controller 10.
However, when no coins are present within the acceptor, the wait time become unnecessary and leads undesirably to a long time necessary for change coin payment.
Therefore, in various types of automatic service machines including automatic vending machines, for the purpose of shortening the coin payment time, there has been suggested such a coin processor that comprises a coin payment unit for simultaneous payment of a plurality of sorts of coins, i.e., for being able to pay out 2 or more coins in each of a plurality of sorts of coins.
The above coin processor comprising the coin payment unit for allowing simultaneous payment of the plurality of sorts of coins is arranged so that a payment pattern is determined on a higher money sort preferential basis for coin payment.
For example, when it is desired to pay a total of 790 yen of change which consists of one 500 yen coin, two 100 yen coins, one 50 yen coin and four 10 yen coins, if the coin processor comprises a coin payment unit for allowing simultaneous payment of 3 sorts of coins, then this can be carried out through 5 paying operations which follow.
______________________________________ First: 500 yen coin 100 yen coin 50 yen coin Second: 100 yen coin 10 yen coin Third: 10 yen coin Fourth: 10 yen coin Fifth: 10 yen coin ______________________________________
That is, a total of 8 coins including one 500 yen coin, two of 100 yen coins, one 50 yen coin and 4 of 10 yen coins are paid out.
Similarly, when it is desired to pay out 790 yen worth of change which consists of one 500 yen coin, two 100 yen coins, one 50 yen coin and four 10 yen coins, if the coin processor comprises a coin payment unit for allowing simultaneous payment of 2 sorts of coins, then this can be carried out through 6 paying operations which follow.
______________________________________ First: 500 yen coin 100 yen coin Second: 100 yen coin 50 yen coin Third: 10 yen coin Fourth: 10 yen coin Fifth: 10 yen coin Sixth: 10 yen coin ______________________________________
This is, a total of 8 coins including one 500 yen coin, two 100 yen coins, one 50 yen coin and four 10 yen coins are paid out.
However, such a prior art coin processor as mentioned above comprising the coin payment unit for allowing simultaneous payment of the plurality of sorts of coins on the higher coin sort preferential basis has had such a problem that, when it is required to pay many coins of low money sorts for example, the time necessary for the coin payment becomes long.